NOT FOR PUBLICATION
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FILED
FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT NOV 16 2009
MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK
U.S. COURT OF APPEALS
JERONIMO DAVID SIQUINA-CHOX, No. 06-72530
Petitioner, Agency No. A070-918-992
v.
MEMORANDUM *
ERIC H. HOLDER Jr., Attorney General,
Respondent.
On Petition for Review of an Order of the
Board of Immigration Appeals
Argued and Submitted November 6, 2009
Portland, Oregon
Before: FISHER and PAEZ, Circuit Judges, and FOGEL, District Judge.**
Jeronimo David Siquina-Chox petitions for review of a Board of
Immigration Appeals (BIA) order affirming an Immigration Judge’s (IJ) denial of
his applications for asylum, withholding of removal and relief under the
*
This disposition is not appropriate for publication and is not precedent
except as provided by 9th Cir. R. 36-3.
**
The Honorable Jeremy D. Fogel, United States District Judge for the
Northern District of California, sitting by designation.
Convention Against Torture. We have jurisdiction under 8 U.S.C. § 1252(a), and
we deny the petition for review.
The IJ identified specific and cogent reasons to support his adverse
credibility finding. See Kaur v. Ashcroft, 379 F.3d 876, 884 (9th Cir. 2004). He
properly relied on both Siquina-Chox’s initial omission of the guerrillas as a source
of persecution and his failure, upon being reminded of his past statements about
the guerrillas, to give an account consistent with those past statements. Because
these discrepancies regarding the source of his persecution go to the “heart of the
asylum claim,” the IJ’s adverse credibility finding is supported by substantial
evidence. Ceballos-Castillo v. INS, 904 F.2d 519, 520 (9th Cir. 1990).
We need not decide whether guidelines issued by the United Nations and the
Immigration and Naturalization Service regarding the treatment of minor asylum
applicants apply here, because the IJ’s treatment and evaluation of Siquina-Chox,
who was 17 at the time of the relevant events and 28 at the time of the hearing,
would not have violated those guidelines.
The petition for review is DENIED.
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